Finding 3: The State is not providing enough education, treatment and job
training to prepare inmates to become responsible citizens once they return to
the community.

Popular wisdom holds that the way to protect the public from crime
is to send criminals to prison. But that idea is undermined by the
reality that nine out of 10 prisoners are released back into the
community. With a median prison term of 21 months, half the inmates
in California prisons today will be back on the streets within two years.

The statistics illustrate that locking up criminals is only half the job of
protecting public safety. The other half is taking advantage of the time
offenders spend in state custody -- in prison and on parole -- to prepare
them to function as responsible citizens, prevent them from committing
future crimes and cycling back into prison.

By all of the evidence, California is not succeeding in that mission. Two-thirds of the inmates in state prison have served time before and were
out on the street for less than a year before returning to prison. The
reasons are not a mystery. A quarter of all inmates are in prison for drug
crimes, and experts say that drug abuse drives criminal activity in 80
percent of all offenders. Many inmates cannot read or write. Many lack
basic living skills, not to mention the education and training needed to
get and keep a job.

Recognizing the influence of drugs on crime, CDC has begun to expand
its drug abuse treatment programs. But drug treatment remains available
to only a small percentage of inmates. And few prisoners and parolees
have access to effective education, counseling and job training.

Reducing Future Crime

For decades in California, rehabilitation was a central function of both
prison and parole. Those efforts were girded by the State's
indeterminate sentencing law, under which offenders were sentenced to
a prison term that spanned a range of years -- such as five years to life --
and were released only when they were deemed by the Adult Authority
to be able to responsibly participate in society. Parolees could be on
parole for 15 years or more. And if they lapsed, the parole agent had
the authority to send them back to prison
for the remainder of the indeterminate
sentence, which could be life.

Determinate sentencing changed all that.
In the mid-1970s, the indeterminate
sentencing system came under attack
because offenders convicted of similar
crimes were serving widely varying
prison terms. About the same time the
idea that criminals could be rehabilitated
became discredited with the publication of a study that was interpreted
to mean that none of the treatments then available were effective at
changing criminal behavior. That study, titled "What Works?" came to
be known as the "Nothing Works" study.(72)

In 1977, indeterminate sentencing, which had been in effect in California
since 1918, was replaced for most crimes by determinate sentencing.
The Determinate Sentencing Act also specifically abandoned
rehabilitation as a purpose of prison and established punishment as the
goal. Except for those convicted of specified serious offenses,
determinate sentencing remains in effect today.

Because determinate sentencing defines the precise term an offender will
serve, inmates now know early in their term when they likely will be
released, whether or not they make any effort to become responsible
citizens. The determinate sentencing law also limits parole to a four-year
period and decreases the time that parole violators can be returned to
prison to no more than one year. As a result, today inmates and
parolees have little incentive to cooperate in programs that might reduce
their criminal behavior.

Recently lawmakers have moved toward restoring rehabilitation as a
purpose of imprisonment. In 1995 the Legislature enacted a bill that
encouraged CDC to develop policies and programs to educate and
rehabilitate nonviolent first-time felony offenders.(73) And some
lawmakers, with an eye on recidivism rates and high prison construction
costs, have pushed unsuccessfully for a significant increase in drug
treatment beds in state prisons.(74)

Education and Job Training

In addition to the 1995 law directed toward nonviolent first offenders,
the Department of Corrections is bound by four other requirements
relating to education and job training for prison inmates:

The Prison Literacy Act: The 1987 law requires the Department
of Corrections to offer a reading program to ensure that all
inmates achieve a ninth-grade reading level by the time they are
released. The law required CDC to make the program available
to at least 60 percent of eligible inmates by January 1, 1996.(75)

Prison Industry Authority: The PIA was established in 1983 with
a two-fold purpose: to reduce the cost of prison operations and
to help rehabilitate inmates by putting them to work. The PIA
operates about 31 industrial, agricultural and services industries
in 23 prisons. Under PIA, inmates produce clothing, shoes,
mattresses and furniture used in the prison, operate the laundry,
and provide printing, lens grinding and other services. The PIA
also sells furniture and office supplies to other state agencies.

Joint Venture Program: The Joint Venture Program was
established in 1990 by a ballot initiative -- Proposition 139 -- to
allow private industry to operate on prison grounds using inmate
labor. Inmates earn wages prevailing in similar industries.

Work-time credits: Statutes provide an incentive for inmates to
participate in programs by allowing them to earn a day off their
term for every day spent working, in the classroom or in job
training. Each year, they can earn up to six months off their
sentence. Inmates also can earn credits if they are in a reception
center or on a waiting list for a program; credit is awarded at a
rate of one day off for every two days on a waiting list. Inmates
sentenced under the Three Strikes law can only reduce their
sentence by 20 percent and inmates convicted of a violent felony
can earn no more than a 15-percent reduction in their sentence.(76)

Despite these requirements, the programs and services provided to
inmates are minimal and a large percentage of inmates do little more
than serve time before they are released. CDC statistics show barely
half of all prison inmates participating in programs at any given time and
less than a quarter receiving the kind of education and vocational training
that might enable them to get a job and integrate into the community.

Prison Programs

Many of the programs available to inmates are provided by organizations
like Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous, which send
volunteers into the prisons, and by private companies and non-profit
organizations under contract to CDC, which furnish both in-prison and
post-release services. The programs vary from institution to institution,
but may include remedial education, literacy classes, stress and anger
management, job training, re-entry classes and a small number of work
furlough opportunities. Most of the programs are voluntary for inmates,
although prisoners earn work-time credits for participation.

According to CDC, as of October 1997, 56.8 percent of the prison
population -- 83,688 inmates -- were participating in education,
vocational or work programs.(77) That proportion has remained constant
in recent years, but represents a drop since July 1993 when the
department reported 62.5 percent of the prison population participating
in programs. The department's definition of "programs," however, is
significant:

Prison jobs. By far the largest share of inmates in the 56 percent
of "programmed" prisoners -- about 46,000 inmates, or a full 30
percent of all inmates -- are working in prison-support jobs:
cooking, cleaning, working in the laundry and groundskeeping for
five or six hours a day. As a member of the Commission's Prison
Advisory Committee noted, "They consider sweeping a tier
'programming.'"

Academic and job training. The proportion of inmates in
academic and vocational programs is much smaller: Some 8
percent of the prison population -- 12,423 inmates -- are in
academic programs; 9 percent of inmates -- 13,674 -- are
engaged in vocational training.

The number of inmates in the Prison Industry Authority and Joint
Venture programs are smaller still: PIA participants number
6,324 -- 4 percent of the prison population -- and those in the
Joint Venture Program total 223 -- .14 percent.(78)

Despite the statutory requirement that CDC offer literacy training
to 60 percent of eligible inmates by January 1, 1996 -- with the
goal that eventually all prisoners achieve ninth grade literacy --
the department reported in 1997 that only 35 to 40 percent of
eligible inmates had access to literacy programs. A 1997 study
by California State University, Sacramento put the median
reading level of state prison inmates at between the sixth and
seventh grades and reported that two-thirds of inmates were
reading below the ninth-grade level.(79)

Those ineligible for programs. According to CDC, about 30
percent of all prisoners are ineligible for assignment to a program.
More than 26,000 of them are ineligible because they are either
marking time at a reception center or had just arrived at an
institution and had not yet received a program assignment.
Another 13 percent --19,461 inmates -- are on waiting lists to get
into a program. About 12 percent are judged unsuitable for
programs because of mental deficiencies or violent behavior.(80)

Drug treatment. Among CDC programs, drug treatment stands
out as a success, but availability is limited to a tiny percentage
of inmates. Until 1997 the department operated just 400 drug
treatment beds in the entire state prison system. Those beds
consisted of 120 treatment slots at the California Institution for
Women at Frontera, 80 beds at the California Rehabilitation
Center at Norco and 200 beds at the Richard J. Donovan prison
near San Diego. With the opening of the 1,478-bed California
Substance Abuse Treatment Facility in Corcoran in autumn 1997,
in-prison treatment slots throughout the prison system total
1,878.(81) The drug treatment programs are provided through
contracts with private treatment providers. In addition, the State
contracts with 200 private firms statewide to provide various
drug treatment services for inmates after release from prison.

Deficiencies in the System

A number of factors account for the small percentage of inmates
participating in programs. Foremost among these is the fundamental
belief of the State's correctional officials that the behavior of most
prison inmates cannot be changed. The Secretary of the Youth and
Adult Corrections Agency told the Commission:

Corrections gets only the worst of the worst -- those who have
failed numerous times before. Seventy-five percent have at least
one prior (conviction) and the average is five priors. The task of
rehabilitation is not easy.(82)

Because of that view the Department of Corrections assigns education
and treatment a low priority, maintaining that its purpose is simply to
keep inmates locked up:

The Department of Corrections' mission is to house the felons
who are convicted and sent to prison. The mission is not to
"correct" them. Our mission is to provide the sanction that the
courts imposed. There are some aspects for low-level first-time
offenders where we do try to provide some help to get them to
refocus their efforts away from crime and away from
victimization toward living as an appropriate citizen in society.But corrections is really derived from the principle of correcting
the conduct by taking them out of law-abiding society.
(83)

For those reasons, and because the department is preoccupied by the
crush of inmates flowing into the prison system, CDC has not put much
effort into developing programs or encouraging outside providers to
furnish services. As a result, even for inmates motivated on their own
to take classes or learn a trade, opportunities are a catch-as-catch-can-proposition. Often classes are full and have long waiting lists. Inmates
may spend an entire sentence on a waiting list and be released before a
spot opens up.

Policy analysts, service providers and academic experts identified a
number of specific shortcomings in the State's programs that limits their
potential to reduce future crimes and long-term prison costs:

No program planning for inmates. Inmates are not assessed to
determine which programs -- education, job training, counseling,
drug treatment -- could be expected to help them not return to
prison. Under the old indeterminate sentencing system prison
sentences were guided by a diagnosis performed at the beginning
of the term and the inmate's release depended upon the inmate's
continued progress. Today inmates begin a sentence at one of
the State's reception centers where they undergo evaluation
devoted mostly to determining security risk rather than program
needs.

Reliance on inmate labor. Because CDC depends on inmates to
perform prison support tasks, the department gives institutional
needs precedence over the need for inmates to receive
meaningful job training or attend classes. If an inmate is needed
in the laundry, he may not receive other job training and
educational opportunities. As the acting supervisor of
correctional education programs at North Kern State Prison said:
"We can't offer educational services to everyone because they
have to work to run the institution. If we took 100 percent of
them our food's not going to get cooked."(84)

Lack of pre-release planning. Under determinate sentencing
inmates are released whether or not they are prepared to return
to the community. Although some pre-release courses are
offered, they are not required and inmates have little incentive to
participate. The department has not expanded re-entry programs
designed to give inmates intensive counseling, job experience and
help finding a place to live and work after they are released. The
department has the same number of work furlough beds (which
have recently been renamed "re-entry centers") that it had a
decade ago -- about 1,350 -- even though the prison population
has more than tripled in that time.(85)

Limiting programs to low-level offenders. CDC restricts
participation in re-entry programs to low-level offenders because
work furlough and other re-entry programs require moving
inmates to halfway houses for the last few weeks of the prison
term. CDC officials say they are reluctant to take the chance
that a prisoner might not be suited to a halfway house, but the
policy has an ironic result: nonviolent offenders may receive help
making the transition to society, while those considered too
dangerous for such programs are released directly from high-security prisons to the streets.

Delivering inmates to re-entry programs late. Under current law,
most inmates can be transferred to re-entry work furlough
programs, which offer education, job placement and other
services to inmates when they are within 120 days of release.
But providers who run the programs say inmates on average
arrive 55 days before the release date and as a result there is less
of a chance that the services will be effective.

Moreover, the in-prison programs suffer from a problem that plagues
most aspects of the correctional system: a lack of rigorous independent
evaluation that could provide policy makers and program managers with
the ability to cost-effectively refine the corrections strategy to reduce
future crimes and as a result the need for additional prisons. This issue
is described in greater detail in Finding 5, which reviews contracting
procedures. But evaluations are essential in government-run, as well as
contracted programs.

Drug Treatment Works

With more than 40,000 prison inmates serving terms for drug crimes,
and as many as 80 percent of all inmates affected by substance abuse,
the State's paucity of in-prison treatment beds means that only 1 to 5
percent of those who might benefit from treatment have a chance of
receiving it. That represents a significant lost opportunity for the State
to break the cycle of drug-addicted offenders who prey on the public
after they are released -- and are ultimately returned to prison again and
again for committing new crimes. One of the nation's leading drug
treatment experts told the Commission:

The incarceration of persons found guilty of various crimes who
are also chronic substance abusers presents a propitious
opportunity for treatment. It is propitious because these persons
would be unlikely to seek treatment on their own, without
treatment they are extremely likely to continue their drug use and
criminality after release, and we now have cost-effective
technologies to effectively treat them while in custody and thus
alter their lifestyles.(86)

Research over the past five years has proven that intensive treatment
programs now available are highly successful at reducing recidivism
among drug-addicted felons -- especially high risk offenders -- chronic
heroin and cocaine users with long histories of predatory crime. Experts
estimate these addict-offenders each commit 40 to 60 robberies a year,
70 to 100 burglaries and more than 4,000 drug transactions.(87)

National evaluations of "therapeutic community" drug treatment
programs like those at the State's Donovan and Corcoran facilities, some
based on nine years of follow-up data, show that high-risk offenders who
complete both the treatment program and the community-based
residential "aftercare" have a 25 percent lower recidivism rate than
control groups, as measured in parole violations, arrests, convictions and
re-incarceration. As the drug abuse expert cited above told the
Commission: "I want to convey
to you our conviction that this
kind of program works."(88)

The drug treatment program at
Donovan provides an example.
That program, which is operated
by Amity Foundation of
California, began in 1989.
Participants are hard-core felons
with extensive criminal histories
who have committed an average
of 321 offenses over a lifetime.
More than 70 percent have
committed a violent crime,
including assault, kidnaping,
manslaughter and rape. Fifteen
percent admit to having
committed murder. The average
participant in the program has
spent more than half of his adult
life in prison.

At the insistence of the Donovan
warden, the Amity program was
purposely designed to subject
participants to the same kind of
temptations to use drugs they are
apt to confront when they leave
prison. The 200 inmates in the
drug treatment program therefore
are not isolated from other
prisoners.

They eat, work and share a yard
with the general prison
population, which consists of 800
other Level III inmates. Program
participants take part in year-long
intensive drug treatment activities
for a minimum of twenty hours a
week, often at night and on
weekends in addition to their
regular 36-hour-a week work
assignments. After release from
prison participants are offered the chance to continue treatment in a
community residential facility in Vista, California. About 35 percent
participate in the aftercare program.

A rigorous evaluation of the Amity-Donovan program funded by the
National Institute on Drug Abuse found the program to have impressive
results. One year after release from prison only 17 percent of those who
completed both the in-prison program and the community-based
aftercare component were re-incarcerated, compared to 66 percent of
a control group who received no treatment. Among those who went
through the in-prison program but did not complete aftercare, 35 percent
were re-incarcerated.(89)

The warden at Donovan, initially skeptical of the program, reported his
surprise over the results when he ordered an unannounced urine test for
Amity participants:

I knew that I had two hundred guys with serious drug problems
all living together, and not isolated from the main yard. We were
busting guys on the yard for drugs, so I knew that if the guys in
Amity wanted to get drugs, they could. I assumed that 25
percent of the people in the Amity program would turn up
"dirty."(90)

Instead, only one Amity participant tested positive for drugs in that test.
A second surprise urine screening in Fall 1996 found not a single positive
test among the 214 Amity inmates. Drug testing of those participating
in the Vista program after release from prison has yielded similar results.

Potential Savings from Drug Treatment

The Legislative Analyst's Office has estimated that modest expansions
of the drug treatment program could save the State millions of dollars a
year. The LAO calculated in May 1997 that extending substance abuse
treatment to an additional 5,000 inmates could save $40 million a year
in prison operating costs and $110 million in one-time capital outlay
expenses by reducing the need for prison beds. Extending treatment to
serve an additional 10,000 inmates over those served today would
increase the savings to $80 million in annual operating costs and $210
million in one-time capital outlay.(91)

Those figures take into account only prison costs. Even more significant
are the economic and social savings that could be captured from these
offenders abandoning criminal behavior. An economist who analyzed
the Amity program using National Institute of Justice data estimated that
in the year before the last incarceration participants were on average
each responsible for $93,000 in emergency room visits, jail costs,
welfare payments for children, court expenses and other costs.

Calculated over a criminal career, unless reformed those felons could be
expected to cost society more than $1.5 million. With many of those
offenders third-strike candidates, the cost of the next incarceration alone
could directly cost the State more than $500,000 per offender.(92)

Targeting the most intensive drug treatment programs such as the
therapeutic community model to the most severe offenders promises to
yield the most benefit. These chronic heroin and cocaine users, who
represent between 3 and 10 percent of all offenders, not only are
responsible for high levels of serious and violent crime, but are also
highly likely to recidivate. The Commission was told:

Without intervention this group will return to crime and drug use
nine times out of ten after release, and will be back in custody
within three years. With appropriate intervention applied for a
sufficient duration, more than three out of four will succeed, i.e.,
reenter the community and subsequently lead a socially
acceptable life.(93)

For less severe drug offenders and for non-drug offenders, relatively low-cost "cognitive skills" programs can make an even more dramatic
difference. These programs, which
incorporate a range of social, vocational
and literacy training components along
with treatment of psychological and
psychiatric problems, have been shown
to reduce recidivism by 40 to 50
percent. One of the most respected of
these program models, "reasoning and
rehabilitation" can be provided for $400
a year per inmate, not including the cost
of training staff. The program consists
of 50 sessions completed over 25-40
weeks and can be accomplished in prison
or in a community-based day reporting
center or other facility.(94)

CDC's acting director told the Commission that the department "has
steadfastly supported substance abuse treatment for offenders."(95) But
the department has been slow to put treatment beds in place. While the
department added the Corcoran facility in the 1997-98 budget, it also
opposed a bill introduced in 1997 that would have added 8,000 new
therapeutic community drug abuse treatment beds over the next five
years. In explaining its opposition the department declared:

It would not be programmatically or fiscally prudent to rapidly
expand this program prior to an evaluation to ensure that the
treatment model, when operated in this larger scale, continues to
result in lower parole revocation rates.
(96)

One other state, Texas, has implemented prison-based drug treatment
on a grand scale. Expansion of in-prison drug treatment, however is
constrained by a shortage
nationally of professional staff
trained in effective drug
treatment techniques.

The Perils and
Opportunities of Parole

Deficiencies in the State's
prison system carry over to
parole. Because inmates receive
little in the way of education, job
training and other preparation for
release, parolees arrive on the
street with little hope of
integrating into the community.
According to CDC, 70 to 80
percent of parolees are
unemployed, 85 percent are
substance abusers, 50 percent
are illiterate, 10 percent are
homeless, and 60 to 90 percent
lack basic survival skills.(97) Yet
the parole system, overwhelmed
with the number of offenders
coming out of prison, has few
services to offer.

As a result, California's record of
parolee success is dismal. Two
out of three of the State's
parolees fail parole and return to
prison within two years. Parole
violators make up a far greater
percentage of prison admittees in
California than in any other state.

In 1995, 60 percent of those
admitted to the State's prisons
were parole violators. By
comparison, in New York the
figure is 22 percent. In Texas, the state most comparable in prison
population to California, the figure is 29 percent.(98)

The cost of re-incarcerating
parole violators is substantial.
The department estimates the
costs of returning a parolee to
prison for violating the conditions
of release at $3,400. Those are
only direct CDC costs, and
assume that the inmate is housed
in an over-crowded, low-security
facility for 4.3 months.

But as the system reaches
capacity, those inexpensive beds
disappear, raising the costs of
housing short-term low-security
inmates. The Legislative Analyst,
for instance, estimates the costs
of holding a low-security inmate
for four months to be closer to
$9,000.(99)
If the parole violator
is sent to one of the private
prisons already under contract,
the typical per diem is $39 a day
-- or more than $5,000 for a 129-day stay. And that bill does not
include many other direct costs to
the State, such as transportation
and processing.

And given the large numbers of technical parole violators, the aggregate
cost is substantial. Assuming CDC's average per inmate incarceration
cost and assuming that technical parole violators comprise 26 percent
of the population, the annual costs of housing parolees who were
returned to custody tops $500 million.

It is possible that California does a better job of catching parole violators
than other states, but indications are that the State's high parolee return
rate stems not from efficient supervision but from a combination of
program deficiency in prisons and a failure to provide parolees with
needed services once they are released.

How Parole Works

Inmates sentenced under the State's determinate sentencing law are
automatically released on parole when they have served the time
specified in the original sentence, minus work-time credits. Parole terms
are shorter than they were under indeterminate sentencing -- parolees
serve no more than four years, with most serving one to three years.

Those who fail parole can only be re-incarcerated for up to one year.
Parole violators -- those who have not committed a new crime, but who
are guilty of not abiding by parole conditions -- can only be returned to
custody for four months.

Within CDC, the Institutions Division is responsible for operating the 33
prisons. Supervising inmates when they are released falls to the Parole
and Community Services Division, which consists of 118 parole offices
in 64 locations throughout California, divided into four regions.

As of March 1997 parolees under supervision in California numbered
101,910. The State has approximately 1,200 parole agents to handle
that caseload -- about one agent for every 85 parolees.(100) That
compares to a national average of one agent for every 70 parolees. The
number of parolees is expected to grow by 5,000 a year over the next
five years.

Because parole offices cannot closely monitor such large numbers of
parolees, CDC has developed a triage process that divides parolees into
three supervision categories, depending on perceived risk:

High control cases(8 - 10 percent of parolees). These parolees
must report to the agent at least twice a month, with the agent
visiting the home once and the parolee reporting to the parole
office once.

Control service cases (60 percent of parolees). These parolees,
most of them nonviolent property offenders, must report to the
agent at least twice a quarter.

Minimum supervisioncases (25 and 30 percent of parolees).
These parolees must report to the parole agent at least twice a
year.(101)

Preparation for release in most cases is
minimal to non-existent. According to CDC
regulations, at least three months before
release, an inmate's options for housing and
employment must be assessed and compiled
into a "field file." CDC claims these files are
prepared on time in 95 percent of all cases.

Based on that information and a risk
assessment, a parole agent recommends the
conditions of parole to be set and determines
what level of supervision the parolee will
receive. The parole office unit supervisor
reviews the agent's recommendations and
sets the parole conditions. A copy is
furnished to the inmate before release.

All parolees must comply with a list of standard conditions, which areshown in the box to the right. In addition to the standard conditions, the
parole agent and unit supervisor can impose special parole conditions,
depending on the individual case. Special conditions for substance
abusers, for example, usually include periodic drug testing.

The most common reason for failing parole and being returned to
custody is for drug use, and parole officials believe that drug abuse is a
contributing factor in many other revocations.

The Purpose of Parole

The Legislature in 1976, declared a broad and important purpose for
parole:

The Legislature finds and declares that the period immediately
following incarceration is critical to successful reintegration of the
offender into society and to positive citizenship. It is in the
interest of public safety for the state to provide for the
supervision of and surveillance of parolees and to provide
educational, vocation, family and personal counseling necessary
to assist parolees in the transition between imprisonment and
discharge.(102)

Despite legislative intentions, however, the State's commitment to
providing supervision and services for parolees falls short. The
Department of Corrections has concentrated $34 million in budget
cutbacks in its parole services in recent years, making for fewer parole
agents to handle increasing caseloads. And with repeat offenders
feeding the number of parolees in the system, CDC is hard-pressed to
provide services. As one department spokesperson told the
Commission, "We're drowning in parolees."(103)

When inmates leave prison they are given $200 and a bus ticket back to
the county where they were convicted. They also are taken to the bus
depot, where a corrections officer waits until they get on the bus. What
additional help they receive depends on individual need and on the
services available at the particular parole office.

Parole agents hand out vouchers
for food and for used clothing.
But for most services CDC refers
parolees to outside providers and
to community service agencies
for emergency relief, such as
short-term room and board or
community health clinics. In rural
areas such services may be few
and in urban areas, city and
county agencies often compete
with parole services for beds.
The department also maintains a
few contracts with counties and
nonprofit organizations to provide
re-entry services to parolees --
counseling, drug abuse treatment,
detoxification, emergency
lodging, and other services to
parolees.

The Department does not keep
records of the number of parolees
who receive services each year or
which services are provided. But
observers estimate that of the
110,000 parolees released in
1996-97, fewer than 10,000
received help finding a job. Fewer than 10 percent receive pre-release
services to help them prepare for re-entry.(104)

An example of these services is the Jobs Plus program. The program
combines social services with job placement, serving parolees through
six community-based subcontractors in 18 parole offices and 23
institutions throughout California. Services provided include pre-employment training and placement assistance, clean and sober
workshops, work clothing and tools, transportation, meals and housing.

The program is outcome-based: Providers receive $500 for every parolee
they help find a job. In 1996-97, the program placed 947 parolees in
jobs and reports that recidivism for the program's employed participants
is only 3.5 percent. Yet, despite its success -- and even though officials
say the program could serve three times more parolees without changing
its structure -- CDC continues to fund the program to serve only 1,000
inmates a year.(105)

Opportunities for Improvement

Research at the national level in just the past five years has proven
that treatments work in reducing recidivism and has identified
which components are needed in effective programs. That research
provides the framework for program design. Program components
important to success include:

Risk assessment tools. Risk assessment tools provide a means
of allocating scarce resources by determining which offenders are
most amenable to treatment and what kind of treatment is most
effective for an individual offender. Assessments examine an
array of factors, including criminal history, education, emotional
problems, alcohol and drug abuse dependency, and attitudinal
elements.

Aftercare. Experts say providing a continuum of treatment
through services provided after inmates are released from prison
-- like those provided by the Vista program for Donovan
graduates -- is critical to program design for drug offenders.

Phased re-entry for drug offenders. Research shows that the
most effective treatments for drug offenders employ a "step-down" approach -- providing for offenders to transition gradually
based on treatment progress. For example, offenders may move
from a three- to six-month preparation period in prison, to a six-
to 24-month stay in a residential community-based facility, to an
outpatient program with several group and individual meetings a
week, to an alumni group meeting once a month.

Multi-service programs. Drug treatment experts emphasize that
a successful drug treatment program must treat more than the
drug addiction. Prison inmates, many of them from extremely
low-income minority backgrounds, often lack social, academic
and vocational skills and may suffer from a variety of
psychological and psychiatric problems. Unless these problems
are addressed along with the drug addiction, offenders may not
respond well. Evaluation of the otherwise successful Stay 'N Out
program in Brooklyn, for example, found that inmates who failed
the treatment program did so not because of drug addiction, but
because they needed vocational help that the program lacked.

Evaluation. Rigorous evaluation and inmate tracking is needed to
help determine what works best with different kinds of offenders
and to enable programs to be continually refined.

The sheer weight of prison population numbers has produced near-unanimous agreement that more should be done to keep offenders from
committing new crimes. The Legislative Analyst's Office, the
Governor's Blue Ribbon Commission on Inmate Population Management,
and the State Controller's Office have all called for improved programs
and services to reduce the State's high recidivism rates. The California
Correctional Peace Officers Association, in its report, Meeting the
Challenge of Affordable Prisons, joined that chorus:

California has one of the nation's worst records when it comes
to parolees being returned to prison for new offenses. This
number could be dramatically reduced -- and significant tax
money could be saved -- if a better job were done helping paroled
inmates return to society.... Improved reentry programs should
...be used to smooth the transition from prison by helping
inmates obtain Social Security cards and drivers' licenses, and by
identifying prospective employers, housing and vocational training
opportunities.(106)

Summary

Officials from CDC have been so preoccupied with burgeoning prison
populations that the prison system has not adequately implemented
efforts that could decrease that population growth by reducing ex-cons
from committing additional crimes once released. With documented
treatment tools available, a proven track record with a state prison, and
solidifying political will the time is right to complete the job of protecting
public safety by keeping criminals who have served prison terms from
committing new crimes against the community.

Recommendation 3: The Governor and the Legislature should enact legislation
providing prison inmates and parolees with the programs and services, such as
drug treatment and cognitive skills programs, that are known to reduce
recidivism in a cost-effective manner.

Sentenced criminals should receive assessments, treatment and
aftercare. The state courts should order assessments to be
conducted to determine what kinds of treatment and educational
opportunities are likely to be effective with individual felons. The
assessments should be used by the Department of Corrections
and county correctional officials when making placement
decisions.

Work programs should be expanded. The State should expand
work programs to involve all eligible inmates, and in particular
those programs that increase prison self-sufficiency and give
inmates the experience needed to increase their employability
upon release.

The prison-based drug treatment should be greatly expanded.
Certain high-level offenders should be targeted for therapeutic
community drug treatment in prison and aftercare programs
following their release. Cognitive skills programs should be
established for low-level and medium-level offenders. Because
the greatest limiting factor will be the availability of trained staff,
the State should fund staff training programs.

The State should create reintegration centers. While CDC has
specialized reception centers that transition inmates into prison,
it has no similar facilities to prepare inmates for successful
reintegration into society. The State could convert existing
facilities, or contract for additional facilities that provide for up to
six months of intensive pre-release preparation. Similarly, the
State should expand the existing work furlough program.

The State should expand parolee assistance programs. CDC
recently demonstrated that job placement, counseling and other
assistance for parolees can significantly reduce the number who
violate their parole and return to prison. These programs are
almost immediately cost-effective and should be expanded.

The State should develop a separate program for parolee failures.
The State should provide separate facilities with specialized
programs for parolees who have shown they are least likely to
respond to assistance and most likely to re-offend.

All programs should be rigorously and independently evaluated.
Innovation will be needed to implement the best methods for
reducing recidivism. Even programs modeled after proven
successes can fail. To establish public confidence and ensure
cost-effectiveness, all educational, vocational and drug treatment
programs should be independently evaluated.

The State should re-evaluate the organizational structure of parole
supervision. Through the master planning process, the State
should explore the potential for providing parole services outside
of CDC. Among the options would be contracting parole services
to county probation departments or to private organizations to
provide a full array of services.

The State should establish a zero tolerance policy of drugs in
prison. Prisoners and prison officials candidly concede that the
prison drug trade is flourishing. While some efforts are being
made to curtail drug use in prison, the State and counties should
escalate this effort, including the use of surprise drug tests.